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Duren Professorship Program

The William L. Duren '26 Professorship Program

Deadline to apply for 2020-2021: TBA Click here for the 2019-2020 brochure with application instructions.

Overview

The William L. Duren '26 Professorship Program was established and endowed with a generous gift from Professor William L. Duren '26, M.A. '28, Ph.D., LL.D. honoris causa '59, professor emeritus of mathematics and former dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Virginia.

Each year, up to three faculty members serve as Duren Professors, and eligibility is open to all full-time professors in the liberal arts, sciences, and engineering. Duren Professors enjoy an especially close relationship to the Newcomb-Tulane College during their tenure in the program. They are provided with additional resources that permit them to adopt distinctive pedagogies (team-teaching, use of auxiliary materials or electronic information technologies, and others), and to arrange for and facilitate distinctive kinds of meaningful interactions with students enrolled in the courses they teach as Duren Professors.

Duren Professors 2019-2020

Professor Guadalupe García, Ph.D.
History

Professor García's Duren-supported course, The Latinx South: Historical Antecedents and Contemporary Issues of U.S. Immigration, is a survey of modern-era immigration policies. The course moves from the mid nineteenth-century forward to focus on the contemporary U.S. South, from Hurricane Katrina through present-day transformations ushered in by the rise of private detention facilities and ICE policing. The class will examine debates around Latinx immigration specifically, including how immigration should be regulated, who has the right to migrate and move, and how immigrants participate in local and national economies. Guest lectures and on-site visits to detention facilities will supplement classroom discussions.

Professor Tiffany Lin, AIA
Architecture

In fall 2018, Professor Lin created the inaugural Intro to Design and Creative Thinking course for non-architecture majors who are interested in design. The course, a lecture/studio hybrid, will continue to offer a broad introduction to the fundamental principles of design, visual communication, and creative problem-solving. Duren funds will allow for expanded, hands-on enrichment activities, including design workshops, field trips, and guest lectures featuring local artists, designers, and professors from allied departments.

Professor Ian K. Townley, Ph.D.
Cell and Molecular Biology

Duren funds will support the creation of an introductory bioinformatics course, the first of its kind at Tulane. Professor Townley says, "(It) will be an immersive inquiry and project-based course where students learn both how to manipulate and ask questions of biological data using cutting edge methods." Introductory Bioinformatics will be taught as a special topics course in spring 2020, and he will work to align his course with the future bioinformatics major that Dr. Laurie Earls, 2018-2019 Duren Professor, is developing a curriculum for.